Townsville to be home of vanadium flow battery manufacturing

Three major companies have signed a collaboration agreement to build a complete vanadium flow battery manufacturing supply chain in Townsville which is set to be operational by 2026.

Idemitsu Australia and Vecco Group, along with Japanese fibre optic cable manufacturing company Sumitomo Electric Industries announced on Wednesday they had signed a collaboration agreement to build a complete manufacturing supply chain in Townsville – from vanadium mining to vanadium flow battery manufacturing.

The agreement will see Idemitsu market, sell, and deliver vanadium flow batteries to Australian customers using Sumitomo Electric hardware, while Vecco Group will mine and refine high purity vanadium at their Julia Creek mine and manufacture battery electrolyte in Townsville.

The partnership makes the most of one of the world’s richest areas for vanadium mining. The Queensland government’s department of resources claims that the state has up to 15% of the world’s estimated resources of vanadium, and some of the richest vanadium deposits in the world.

Queensland has targeted vanadium as a key natural resource for the clean energy transition and already has two mines – including Vecco’s Julia Creek mine. Vecco Group secured support from Queensland’s Industry Partnership Program to establish Australia’s first vanadium electrolyte manufacturing facility, currently operating in Townsville.

Vecco has also secured a 3.2-hectare site at Cleveland Bay Industrial Park (CBIP), in the Townsville State Development Area, for a commercial vanadium flow battery production facility which is currently in the detailed design phase.

“Today’s announcement shows how our 75% emissions reduction target by 2035 secures investment in new blue-collar clean economy jobs across our regions,” said Steven Miles, Queensland’s premier.  

“We are taking vanadium from Julia Creek – one of the world’s biggest and best vanadium resources – and turning it into batteries here creating more local jobs.

“We know those batteries will provide deep storage into our own grid, but today we are taking it a step further.

“This means manufacturing the vanadium flow batteries needed in Australia to transition to renewable energy and supplying vanadium electrolyte to the world.”

The consolidation in one location of a complete supply chain from mining to battery production will further cement Australia as a leading proponent of vanadium flow batteries.

While the majority of vanadium mined around the world is currently used to make steel, it is the element’s use in creating flow batteries that is reinvigorating demand. Flow batteries – which uses two chemical components dissolved in liquid that are then pumped through a system on separate sides of a membrane – may offer lower energy density, but offer longer storage times and more recharge cycles, lasting at least 20 years.

Vanadium flow batteries, on the other hand, don’t need two chemical components, given that the element can be used as a single electroactive element instead of two. These batteries are particularly helpful in providing grid energy storage.

“Demand for vanadium flow batteries is rapidly increasing to meet the world’s energy storage demands,” said Tom Northcott, managing director of Vecco Group.

“Over 7.4GWh of vanadium flow battery projects globally are currently under construction or have been announced in the last 12 months. 

“The decision for Idemitsu to market and deploy vanadium flow batteries using Sumitomo and Vecco products acknowledges the scale of the opportunity.”